Beading with Kittens

There are a lot of things that do not go together paw in paw, at least not most of the time. Ummmm, pickles and strawberry ice cream. (Yeah, a lot of people will like these things, it's just not my favorite.) What else? The toner for my old printer and what the new printer will accept. That one I'm sure of! Oh yes, and this one. Kittens and beading. We have a little apartment which we share with two Siamese kittens and one fabulous ergonomic jewelry bench (thanks to my husband) where I can sit or stand. So most of the time I'm really good about putting things away before I walk away. But today I was working on a necklace and the phone rang.

Foolishly, I tucked my necklace under my bead mat and went the few yards to get the phone. When I looked into our living room, my smaller kitten (she's the one who looks like the little feline version of Paris Hilton or maybe more Audrey Hepburn) was sitting in my chair, sticking her little grey paw under the bead mat and before you could say "We are Siamese if you DON'T please," she had that half-necklace - half-bare wire and was pulling it dead-snake-style across the avocado carpet!

So she's trying to gnaw on her prey and when I run up to her, she's startled and jumps. Cashew-sized white pearls go flying all over the room and she bolts outta there. The bigger Siamese, our boy who's one year old, looks like he's training to be a linebacker for the Broncos and will eat anything as long as it's truly inedible, comes in. He's full of glee at the little white balls of Hazardous Choking Danger all over the floor. I have this feeling of being the *worst* Kitty Mama in the world as he and I race around the room. As soon as I pick up a bunch of pearls, he's found another one and is racing toward it. It's clearly a game for him. My knees are just loving this!

So I pull myself up off the floor with a handful of pearls and a bare wire that used to be half of a necklace with a well thought-out pattern. I now have both of the kittens at my feet and they're meowing as only Siamese can and looking up at me like they're going to eat me for dessert.

Thankfully this sort of thing very rarely happens. Kitten-proofing your beading spaces is a never-ending challenge.